Ruminations by a non-academic general surgeon from the heart of the rust belt.

Thursday, July 2, 2009

WaPo Inanity

This is just mindboggling. John Bolton (neocon extraordinaire) has an op-ed in the Washington Post today where he advocates that now is the time for a pre-emptive Israeli strike against Iran. Do these people have no sense of shame?

Those who oppose Iran acquiring nuclear weapons are left in the near term with only the option of targeted military force against its weapons facilities. Significantly, the uprising in Iran also makes it more likely that an effective public diplomacy campaign could be waged in the country to explain to Iranians that such an attack is directed against the regime, not against the Iranian people. This was always true, but it has become even more important to make this case emphatically, when the gulf between the Islamic revolution of 1979 and the citizens of Iran has never been clearer or wider. Military action against Iran's nuclear program and the ultimate goal of regime change can be worked together consistently.

That's right, all it's going to take is some sort of mass P.R. campaign (pamphlets? spam mail?) to convince the majority of Iranians that when Israeli fighter planes start dropping bombs on Tehran it's nothing personal--- hey, we just don't like Khanenei! We're on your side!

Yes, this is the same paper that features Charles Krauthammer, refuses to use the word "torture" in reference to the, um, torture organized and implemented by the Bush regime, and that just fired their only left leaning on-line columnist (Dan Froomkin). What a joke. Furthermore, the Iranian people just spent the past 2 weeks courageously rising up against the results of a sham election. The subsequent brutal, totalitarian crackdown has only made the Islamic theocracy more vulnerable and less legitimate in the eyes of its citizens. Unrest continues to foment. And so now is the time to send Jewish F-16's into the heart of Shi'ite Islam????

10 comments:

Ummm guess who the American President was who sent a team of Rangers, Seals, Helicopters, etc into Iran...Hint, his initials are "JC".If it wasn't for the Israelis, Iraq would have had Nukes in the 80's... Google "Osiraq" sometime...

The distasteful part is how an American journalist/commentator would brush off all diplomatic solutions at work and advocate such military strike right off the bat amids current uprising & bloodshed in Iran. An inane & callous [militaristic] Cold War junkie indeed.

The most basic function of a government is to protect its citizens. The Iranian government has clearly time and time again described their wish to destroy the state of Israel, using terms like "Holocaust" and "conflagration". Israel would be foolish to allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons under these conditions. It will be the fault of the international community (including the US) for not being more aggressive in the diplomatic options. The international community has repeatedly demonstrated time and time again to Israel (and to Jews in general for thousands of years) that we will do nothing while others try to kill them; now can we really blame the modern jewish state (founded after the last organized attempt to slay them) for being proactive in their defense?

While I dislike when such discussions devolve into ad hominen attacks involving accusations of racism, I would point out that your use of the term "jewish F16s" instead of Israeli F16s" could be misinterpreted....

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